The Mithraic Mysteries remain one of the most enigmatic religious formations of the Roman world. Flourishing across the empire especially among soldiers, officials, and men connected to imperial mobility, Mithraism left behind a rich archaeological and iconographic record but no surviving doctrinal corpus. This paper proposes a structural and symbolic interpretation of Mithraism as a subterranean system of inward recovery within the mediated order of Roman imperial life. Rather than treating the
